Ambulatory Surgery Centers Here are some details on two new surgery centers that opened this month. FOX 23 News reports that Hillcrest Hospital South in Tulsa, Okla., opened a new outpatient surgery center yesterday. The 17,000-square-foot facility features four ORs, two procedure rooms and 19 pre-op and post-op bays. Meanwhile, the opening of…
According to a report from The Philadelphia Inquirer, the Philadelphia region’s largest health insurer, Independence Blue Cross (IBX), launched a policy this month that is “designed to move care into lower-cost surgery centers and away from hospitals and clinics that can generate payments twice as high for the same treatment.”…
Ambulatory Surgery Center Association (ASCA) CEO Bill Prentice last week submitted comments in response to CMS’ 2027 Inpatient Prospective Payment System Proposed Rule. In particular, Mr. Prentice provided feedback on a request for information regarding the inclusion of ASCs in the Transforming Episode Accountability Model (TEAM) or “other similar episode-based…
No state in the union has fewer ASCs than Vermont does, at just two. But it appears that it will soon gain a third. According to reporting by Vermont Public, regulators at the Green Mountain Care Board have unanimously greenlit planned multispecialty ASC Upper Valley Surgery Center in Hartford, which…
When it’s not clear who’s taking a patient home after their procedure at an ASC, the resulting ambiguity and uncertainty can cause a discharge delay or even a same-day cancelation of their procedure before it even begins. Two safety and risk management experts from patient safety organization ECRI—Anna Thomas, MSN,…
Nonprofit health system Ascension announced that it has officially completed its long-anticipated acquisition of ASC management, development and operation company AMSURG. Ascension’s ASC network now expands to 300 facilities nationwide. “This is a critical step in Ascension’s growth strategy, directly responding to the national shift toward the outpatient setting,” stated…
Academic health system Cooper University Health Care, which serves southern New Jersey, announced plans for a “transformative” $300 million multispecialty outpatient campus in Gloucester Township that it states will “expand access to advanced specialty care services” across the region. The planned five-story, nearly 184,000-square-foot campus will become Cooper’s largest ambulatory…
Ascension announced that it has “received approval” from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to move forward with its acquisition of AMSURG’s ASC business. “This regulatory milestone is a significant step toward our expected official closing in the near future,” stated the nonprofit health system, which anticipates adding more than 250 ASCs…
The Ambulatory Surgery Center Association (ASCA) announced that Todd Currier, CASC, CEO and administrator of Bend (Ore.) Surgery Center, has been elected as its new board president. ASCA, which represents more than 6,500 Medicare-certified ASCs across the U.S., stated that Mr. Currier received unanimous support from the ASCA board and…
“Can you have outpatient brain surgery in an ambulatory surgery center?” That’s the question neurosurgeon Richard Menger, MD, MPA, tackles in an article for Forbes that encourages current and future patients not to dismiss the idea outright. Dr. Menger, who is also a political scientist, is vice chair of neurosurgery,…
